


Tamashi (Soul)

by vogue91



Category: Yamada Tarou Monogatari | The Story of Yamada Taro (TV)
Genre: Affection, Feelings, Gen, Introspection, M/M, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-26
Updated: 2018-03-26
Packaged: 2019-04-08 09:24:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 936
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14102370
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vogue91/pseuds/vogue91
Summary: That the jubilation of colours, or branches and petals wasn’t enough if Takuya couldn’t feel anything in front of them.





	Tamashi (Soul)

_Flowers never lie._

He had always thought it was a silly thing his grandfather had made up to push him to do his best in whatever he did.

He should’ve forgotten the provocation, stopped dedicating to that _useless_ hobby and not let him win.

But somehow, as much as he tried, he could never stop.

For some weird reason, he liked it. He liked watching those flowers spread casually on the glass table, the light reflecting all their colours, and pretending he didn’t care.

And yet he had come to a point where he couldn’t even lie to himself; he went to them as if attracted by a force he couldn’t explain, and he started arranging them without thinking about it, aware of what he had done just when he saw the finished work.

He almost always liked the result of those moments of apparent madness and detachment from reality.

But it was never enough, because flowers never lie.

And his compositions, as much as he thought it was something ridiculous, told his grandfather he wasn’t putting enough passion in it, that he lacked something to do this right.

That the jubilation of colours, or branches and petals wasn’t enough if Takuya couldn’t feel anything in front of them.

And if Takuya felt a greyness inside of himself, he was never going to translate himself into his creations.

Because flowers never lie. And he had learnt to read that true all too soon, and even sooner to desire he wasn’t able to.

 

~

 

It was the exact same feeling he had felt in front of _him_.

Watching him, gazing into him, trying to read inside, to see the secret behind his smile.

Trying to keep away from him, never managing to do that.

Like those beautiful, cursed flowers.

Takuya envied them and he envied Yamada.

He envied the vivacity of the colours they both emanated, those he was never going to have.

That’s what he thought, while he followed him through the sunny streets of Tokyo, and he kept repeating himself he wasn’t supposed to be there.

There had been many things in his life he shouldn’t have done, and yet for some sordid trick of fate, he always ended up in the most alluring situation, that then hurt him the worst.

It hurt him that his grandfather couldn’t see a soul inside his creations.

It hurt him that Yamada seemed so absurdly... happy. And he liked seeing him that way, more than he should’ve.

He liked his constant smiles, his energy, the will to live that he always brought with him. Just, he felt the strange feeling of wanting to be a part of that very same happiness, as if it was a secret the boy was keeping from the world.

A secret that was soon unveiled, against all odds, when Takuya saw him go to his house.

When he saw the thin walls, the coloured cans hung to some wire in front of the door, too weak to resist to anything. When he saw his world, of cardboard and metal sheets and scarce blades of grass, it was like it had all become clear.

Yamada didn’t have a thing.

And yet, he had all he was lacking.

He saw the smiles of those kids, and he realized that it was what he would’ve needed to be happy as well.

A _family._ Affection. Be willing to have a billion problems, just to have someone to share them with.

He went back home smiling, shaking his head from time to time.

That night, his composition wasn’t as beautiful as usual.

And yet, somehow, he could see in it colours he had never seen before.

 

~

 

_‘Euryops pectinatus’_

That was the name of the flower, he thought to remember.

Those very same flowers laying ungracefully on the same glass table, abandoned out of impatience, of rage and frustration on Takuya’s part.

And now one of them, lacking its stem and any other part that wasn’t strictly necessary to appreciate its beauty, was resting in some water, in a common glass.

Nothing complex, overthought, weird, showy.

Simple.

Like Yamada.

Beautiful.

_Like Yamada._

That Yamada, blushing, while he pretended too well to be a woman for a mere whim from Takuya, a boy whose boredom had brought to that kind of pure _sadism._

But he hadn’t done it to hurt him. Never.

In his way he wanted to help him, in the only way the other boy would’ve accepted it from him.

With unnecessary details, which had definitely proven funny.

Yet now he couldn’t even laugh about the situation they were in. He could just look at that flower, thinking it was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.

“Ikebana is a mirror reflecting people.” he heard his grandfather’s voice as if it was the first time he was hearing it, as if for the first time he was actually capable of understanding what he was saying.

Ikebana was like a mirror reflecting people.

That flower, so bare in that glass so damn simple, was nothing compared to his usual composition.

And yet his grandfather had seen something in it, something usually lacking from his creations, and finally Takuya was able to understand what that flower had of so particular as to attract him.

In it, in every refraction of its reflection in that miserable surface of water, there was something shining that not everyone was allowed to see.

He didn’t know what was giving him that awareness, but if asked what that was, he would’ve answered without hesitating.

In that glass, simple and miserable glass, was enclosed Yamada’s soul.

 


End file.
